National credit bureau fully operational by year-end

MANILA, Philippines - State-run Credit Information Corp. said it is “fairly on track” to becoming fully-operational by year-end following a meeting with credit bureaus interested in putting up a domestic credit information system.

In a briefing, CIC president and CEO Jaime P. Garchitorena said his firm had just concluded a second meeting last week with eight credit bureaus applying for operation in the country.

Garchitorena said the CIC discussed the accreditation process for these credit bureaus or what they call “special accessing entities.”

“By December, we should have as many as we deem fit. They will go through an accreditation process,” he said.

“It’s not necessarily correct that just because they have the money for it that they can become a special accessing entity right away. They have to pass through the filters of best practices in their areas where they home offices are located as well as they have to present a business plan which has to match the goals of the CIC,” Garchitorena said.

The government owns 60 percent of the CIC, while the remaining 40 percent is held by the Bankers Association of the Philippines, Chamber of Thrift Banks, Rural Bankers Association of the Philippines, Philippine Cooperatives Center, and the Credit Card Association of the Philippines.

CIC was created in 2008 to establish a central system for credit information partly to ease the access of individuals and corporations for loans.

Garchitorena said the credit bureau would have to extract data from people or businesses with literally no credit history or data at all and that remains a challenge for CIC today.

Aside from bank loan history, the CIC plans to collate data from telcos and utilities to draw a pattern for individuals and firms.

Putting up this database will help more people access funding with less collateral as banks and financial institutions will more aware of their credit behavior, Garchitorena noted.